


Skeleton Code

by Gallagher



Category: Undertale (Video Game)
Genre: Baby's First Fanfic, Fluff, Gender-neutral Reader, One Shot, Other, Reader-Insert, desktop buddy, ukagaka
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-09-26
Updated: 2017-09-26
Packaged: 2019-01-05 20:00:30
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 9,014
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12196416
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Gallagher/pseuds/Gallagher
Summary: It was supposed to be a program.Nothing more.





	Skeleton Code

**Author's Note:**

> This fic is based on the Sans Ukagaka floating around the internet. Specifically, the version made by [hatterheather](http://hatterheather.tumblr.com/).  
>   
> You can find it [here](http://hatterheather.tumblr.com/post/139992566722/the-wait-is-over-update-3-is-here-at-last).  
>   
> Also, you can find me on tumblr as [gallathegalla](https://gallathegalla.tumblr.com/).  
>   
> cool

_ Undertale _ was the game that everyone knew.

Well, not  _ everyone _ . People in your real life never heard of the game, outside of when you talked about it. That was nothing new.

Everyone online, at least, seemed to have heard of the game. A lot of them loved it, and a lot hated it — or, they hated the people that loved it, anyway. You couldn’t really blame them, considering some of the cruel things people said to one another in posts and comments.

As for you? You always felt that your love for the game, as strong as it was, never really fit with all the others. Sure, every now and then there would be an AU that you liked, but they usually only covered small changes from the canon. The idea of Chara narrating the game was hilarious, Sans with a gap between his teeth was adorable, and the shipping… well, even if your friends were just as into  _ Undertale _ as you, there were some finds you weren’t going to share.

You fawned over each new piece of fanwork you found, you listened to the soundtrack on repeat — not to mention all the great fan music you could find — and, of course, you owned the game. You’d watched so many playthroughs of it that you had a top five favorites list, not to mention your personal voice cast for each of the characters.

Yet you never could bring yourself to play the game like everyone else did. It felt weird to control Frisk that way, especially with how aware the game was of its player. You could never play for more than half an hour at a time, and even then, you couldn’t bring yourself to go around killing monsters. It was part of the game. You’d seen how it went plenty of times. It still felt… wrong.

You, you’d decided when you’d first noticed, were a little messed up.

 

It was the middle of the night, but you had only been awake for a few hours. There weren’t any new messages on your phone, and when you’d rolled out of bed and set up your computer, you hadn’t found any there, either. Sitting at your desk, you checked your favorite sites again, just in case someone had posted something cool in the last ten minutes, and chugged your water, getting rid of the lingering taste of mint on your teeth. There wasn’t anything too interesting. Mostly reposts. Some of them were still cute, so that was fine. You ended up continuing where you’d left off the day before, looking at various games people had made. Most were the same, little battles with a popular character that undoubtedly had some twist to it, or with an OC of some sort. They were cool and all, but not enough for you to download them and try for yourself.

The sun was peeking in from the crack in your curtains when you found something interesting. It wasn’t like the other games. It didn’t look much like a game at all. It was just… a program. A calendar, a clock, a file cleaner. Nothing special. Except that it was all done through a character you could interact with. A ‘ghost’ it was called. It sat on your desktop and talked to you now and then. And, to no great surprise, it looked like Sans. You could have rolled your eyes at the fandom’s love of the skeleton, if you weren’t just as guilty of it.

Before you knew it, you downloaded the hopefully-not-a-virus, moved it to your desktop, and started it up. You wiggled your mouse on your screen as you waited.

And waited.

Then, the image of the skeleton popped up in the corner of your screen.

He stood with his hands in his pockets, staring blankly out at where you would have been, if you weren’t slumped and resting your chin in your hand. He didn’t do anything, but he was cute, so you pulled open the ‘readme’ file to figure out how he worked.

You made it through a few lines before a dark block with white font popped up beside Sans.

‘hey, frisk,’ his text said, and you couldn’t help but smile. It was cute that  _ that _ was the default name. A little weird, but cute. ‘you can poke my belly to bring up the menu. you can change how often i speak, and you can have me do a bunch of other cool stuff.’

Either the programmer was really good, or that was quite the coincidence. You clicked on his shirt… and nothing happened. You huffed and tried double clicking. This time, a long menu popped up. You scanned it for a moment, then chose ‘You say hello to Sans!’

His face changed, small creases under his eyes making his expression seem pleased. ‘sup?’

 

Nothing really changed. When you weren’t working on something, you were poking around on the internet, or sitting at your desk with a book. You’d read most of Sans’ dialogue in the first couple of days of downloading him, and yet every day without fail, whenever you would start your computer, the first thing you did was click his icon and load his ghost into the corner of your desktop. You always said ‘hello’ as soon as he was there. It was just a script in a program, but seeing his text pop up at the same intervals with the same jokes or the same words of comfort… it helped make your days a little less bland. It didn’t matter what time you woke up or how long you  _ stayed _ awake. He was always there. He was always smiling. And you were always sure to say ‘goodbye’ to him before you shut down to sleep.

It wasn’t the healthiest ritual, but it got you through the day, whether that day was an hour long or thirty.

 

It was a little less than a month since you’d downloaded the ghost. Not much had changed, but you were alright with that. No change was better than things getting worse, as far as you were concerned. It was late in the afternoon and you were exhausted, but knowing you would likely sleep for half a day, you couldn’t  _ not _ get on and say hello to Sans. A warm cup of tea beside you, you booted up your computer, then your desktop buddy, and waited.

And waited.

You frowned when Sans didn’t show up immediately and checked the corner of your screen. It looked like it was updating. Strange. You didn’t know it could do that on its own. Before you could get too worked up about viruses and hackers, Sans popped up in his usual spot.

Except this time, it looked like he was… breathing? He definitely wasn’t the static image you’d gotten used to. You opened up your browser and pulled up the page you’d gotten the ghost from in the first place. There weren’t any new posts. You glanced over at Sans, only to see his eyes were following your cursor. He was sweating.

‘hey,’ his box read when it popped up, making the same dialogue sound as it always had in the game. He eyed the box, hesitating before he continued, ‘is someone there?’

“What the hell…?” you muttered to yourself. It was a question, but no options came up for you to answer. You slid your cursor over and his attention snapped to it. He leaned away and against the side of your screen while you clicked on his dialogue box. Nothing showed up, and pressing keys you knew the ghost used before didn’t do anything. After a moment, Sans seemed to relax enough to step away from the screen’s edge. His text box usually faded by now, but it was still there, standing dark and empty beside him.

‘heh.’ You both watched as the text appeared. ‘this wasn’t the kind of shortcut i had in mind.’

You laughed and rubbed a hand against your forehead. That was  _ definitely _ not a line you’d seen before. You sat back in your chair and watched as Sans continued to look around. Your browser took up about half of your screen, the rest showing your mostly empty desktop and, of course, Sans. He took a hand out of his pocket, something else you’d never seen him do before, and touched the side of his dialogue box. When nothing happened, he grabbed it and pushed it up higher on the screen until it was up above his head. You almost expected it to fall when he let go of it, and he looked like he did, too, judging from how slow he was to take his hands away. It kept in place like you’d dragged it there yourself.

‘hmm.’ Sans leaned over to look up at the box. Without thinking about it, you grabbed your mouse and moved it even farther out of the way, well above what he could reach. ‘thanks,’ he said, looking up at the cursor. You brought it down so he didn’t have to crane his neck. ‘i needed some room to stretch these bones.’

There was still no prompt for you to click, so you sat and waited, watching Sans. He only stared at the cursor for another few seconds before he looked around the rest of your screen.

‘hey, you still there?’

You blinked, looking from his dialogue box down to the skeleton’s face. There still wasn’t anything to choose. You wiggled your mouse instead.

‘looks like i’m in a computer or something. that right?’

Your fingers tightened around your mouse, then you moved it up and down.

‘great.’ His eyes, focused on the cursor until now, looked out through the screen at you. ‘you got a word processor on this thing?’

“Word…? Oh!”  _ Duh. _ You used notepad all the time as it was, so it only took a few seconds to find it in your start menu. It opened in the middle of your screen. You minimized your browser, pulled the notepad down to Sans’ level, and typed, ‘got it.’

He turned to read those two short words, or rather, you thought he was until he reached out and grabbed the notepad window just as he had his own dialogue box. ‘hey im using this,’ you typed, the letters appearing despite the window shaking.

‘sorry, bud,’ he replied, looking more pleased with himself than he was apologetic. ‘this is sorta new for me, if you didn’t notice.’

‘same here,’ you typed instantly, but then, you frowned. ‘wait but i’ve had you on here for ages?’

‘hate to disappoint you, kid, but this is my first time talking to you.’

‘Im not a kid’

‘that’s not the point.’

‘ive had your program for a few weeks now,’ you started to type, but paused when you heard Sans’ dialogue.

‘i’m not a program, _ kid _ .’

‘thats not the point.’

‘heh.’

You rolled your eyes and went on, ‘ive been running not-you every day and this hasnt happened before. not-you always says the same things, and doesnt move.’

Sans shoved his hands back into his pockets and shrugged. ‘sounds like a real numbskull to me.’

‘lol.’

He looked towards you, those slight creases around his eyes warming his expression. You watched as he walked across the screen, examining your sparse few desktop icons. Then, his eyes turned down to the taskbar he was standing on. The one indicating his program was labeled simply ‘sans’. ‘so,’ he said, the softness in his gaze now gone, ‘you know about me.’

‘yeah.’

‘and?’

‘and what?’

‘c’mon, kid. this is weird enough as it is without playing games.’

You chewed on your lip and leaned back in your chair. You had to admit, you’d imagined something like this happening before. Your ghost becoming real. A real person, a real friend. Those thoughts usually ignored the parts where Sans would want to know what the hell was going on. You never wanted to think of how it would  _ really _ be.

‘hellooo?’

You looked up to see Sans leaning forward, a hand pulled out of his pocket. You weren’t sure what would happen if he tried touching your screen, and you weren’t eager to find out. For all you knew, it might break your monitor, or mess up his data. If he had any to begin with. ‘im here.’

‘good. you had me worried there.’

He didn’t look all that worried, but you couldn’t blame him for that. You’d spent plenty of time with not-sans, but he didn’t know the first thing about you, and he was, probably, in the more vulnerable position here. It wasn’t like he could potentially erase you with a few clicks. ‘sorry. i dont know whats going on.’

‘but you know me?’

‘sort of.’

‘you’re gonna have to do a little better than that.’

You huffed and tapped on the backspace even after your last words were gone. With the way Sans eyed the notepad window, he must have noticed. Eventually, you wrote, ‘i know you as a character. in a videogame. not as a real person or anything. the rest of the underground, too.’

‘that, uh… heh… that’s not what i wanted to hear.’

‘yea well its not what i wanted to SAY either but here we fkn r, i dunno wtf u want from me.’

‘whoa, take it easy, kid,’ Sans replied, glancing to you, then back at your text. ‘i didn’t mean it like that.’

Of course he didn’t. You sighed and held the backspace, erasing your text. Once it was gone, you sat and watched the cursor blink at you. For a few moments, Sans didn’t seem like he was going to press for more. When he shifted his weight, you finally typed, ‘its a really popular game on the internet right now. Its about frisks adventure through the underground and how they get along with all the monsters.’

‘that right?’ Sans asked, his shoulders stiff. ‘frisk wouldn’t happen to be a common name for humans, would it?’

‘not really.’

‘guess i don’t have to tell you.’ He stood with his side to you, the thick outline of his seemingly drawn form blending into the divot of his nose. A bright eye slid into view, filling the dark eye socket you could see as he looked your way. ‘a human recently wandered into snowdin.’

You wondered then if he could see you. If he could see the way you worried your hands, pressing one thumb against the nail of the other, or how the pressure turned your skin dark as  blood was trapped in your fingertips. If he knew how your gaze flicked away from him and down to your keyboard, only to be drawn back up without fail.

Whether he could or not, he was patient.

‘kid?’

To a point.

‘im not a kid.’ He shrugged, his eye sliding up to the top of his socket. ‘have,’ you wrote, pressed space, then hesitated. Sans turned his head away from you and towards your text. ‘have they hurt anyone?’

You couldn’t see what Sans was looking at, but his face, at least, stayed turned to the notepad. You could see the movement of his breaths in the folds of his coat. ‘no.’ His hood was almost the same cool grey as your taskbar. His coat stood out against your warm, multicolored wallpaper. ‘will they?’

‘i dont know.’ Sans’ shoulders rose, then fell in a sigh you couldn’t hear. ‘the player controls frisk. some people fight, some dont. you can beat the game either way. a lot of them play until they get each ending.’

The skeleton’s dialogue box remained blank and black in the corner of your screen. He stepped away from the notepad, looking up at your desktop icons, then turned to you. He took a hand from his pocket and pointed to the  _ Undertale _ icon, above and to the left of his head. ‘that’s it, right?’

‘yeah. howd you know?’

‘that’s the only way i see to get outta here.’

_ Oh. _

‘thanks for filling me in.’

‘sans—’

‘see ya later, buddy.’

 

Sans was gone as suddenly as if you’d closed the program yourself, taking his dialogue box with him. The program, however, stayed open in your taskbar. The ghost you knew didn’t come back.

You powered down your computer and crawled into bed.

 

It was dark before you could fall asleep.

 

When you woke, it was early morning. Not quite morning enough for anyone else in the house to be up, but not quite early enough for it to still be dark, either. You turned on your computer, then left it to boot up while you went about your ‘morning’ ritual. Bathroom. Phone. Stretches. Teeth. Drink.

Your computer looked the same as it always did. There was no evidence that anything out of the ordinary had happened when you were, admittedly, exhausted out of your gourd. You started up your ghost and got comfortable while he loaded.

It was a full minute later that you realized that the corner you were watching was empty. The usual box that told you it was working had popped up, sure, but after that there was nothing. You made sure he wasn't minimized, or stuck off screen somewhere, and even tried clicking where he usually stood. Nothing. You opened up the file. Everything was just how you remembered it, it just  _ wasn't working _ .

You sighed and rubbed the heels of your hands against your eyes, pressing hard enough for it to ache ever so slightly. It wasn't a dream, you knew that for sure. What did that leave?

Hallucination, probably. You did have a history, even if it was years since it happened last.

You shivered and dropped your hands. It  _ was _ years, though. The thought of it happening again was more frightening than the idea of it being real.

Either way, there wasn't much to do about it. You opened up your browser and checked the IMs you'd missed while it loaded.

 

Everything was… normal. Normal as of a month ago, at least. Your friends were the same. The internet was  _ definitely _ the same. And you, you missed having that soft, round face in the corner of your screen at all hours, but otherwise, your day passed as it normally did.

Nothing really changed. You liked it that way.

 

You were out in the living room with the rest of the family. Each of you had claimed your own spot to eat dinner and watch the night’s movie. Your step-dad had the couch, and with it, all of the coffee table. Your grandmother had the chair at her desk, her work papers stacked out of the way. It was arguably the best seat, since she was set up with a place to prop her feet and a pad that warmed  _ and _ vibrated under her. You were left with the loveseat and a wooden tv tray, but at least your spot was the one under the air vent.

You and your step-dad made fun of the movie, while your grandmother couldn’t quite keep up with what was going on, considering all of the dogs kept trying to get her attention, and her food.

It wasn’t every day that you could all hang out together. Not that you didn’t see either of them. Living in the same house, it was hard  _ not _ to see them every day. All of you just went about at your own beat. Your grandmother worked at her computer in the mornings and napped in the afternoons, while your step-dad slept in most days and wasn’t really up to do anything until after noon. Your schedule, of course, varied week to week. You took advantage of any opportunity for you all to enjoy something together, even if it was just a shitty movie.

When the credits rolled, you climbed out of your perfectly squashed cushions and gathered plates to take back to the kitchen. If your step-dad or you didn’t stay on top of messes, your grandmother always went behind your backs and did everything herself, even if it made her back ache and her ankles swell. It was the least you could do to help. And if while you cleaned you happened to wonder if Sans would be waiting for you when you got back to your room, you certainly didn’t tell either of them.

 

Only a day without your little desktop buddy and you were already missing out on the terrible jokes he always cycled through.

Thankfully, the internet was full of comics to help fill the gap.

 

It was no real surprise that your two best friends noticed the recent dip in your mood. You didn’t hesitate to tell them about your ghost not working anymore. They were friends for good reason. One of them spent extra time finding funny pictures and videos for you both to laugh at, while the other distracted you with group chats and games.

 

It was four in the morning. You’d gone to bed with a headache, and when you’d woken up, you could still feel your pulse thick behind your ears.

The corner of your screen was empty. You tried to redownload your ghost, but each time it would finish and you tried to run it, nothing would happen.

 

You were stretching your legs when you heard it. The dull tones of Sans’ dialogue filtered through your speakers. You almost tripped over yourself getting back into your chair and flipping the monitor back on.

He stood in the corner like he always had, the dark box with his text above his head where you’d left it. ‘anyone there?’

You opened notepad. ‘yes!’

‘heh. happy to see me, kid?’

You pressed backspace and typed again, ‘yes!’ Sans nodded his head, a small, tense line beside his grin. ‘i didnt think youd come back. or maybe id, yknow…’ He shifted his weight and looked towards you, waiting. The corners of your lips twitched up. ‘dreamt it. i was pretty tired.’

‘that right?’

He wasn’t interested in all of that mess. Obviously. ‘how are things with frisk?’

‘that’s why i’m here, actually. i wanted to ask you something.’

‘?’

‘what should i expect when the kid gets moving again?’

_ Hopefully nothing bad _ . He didn’t look at you while he waited for your answer. He watched your cursor blink from halfway across the screen. ‘depends how far theyve gotten. you said theyre in snowdin?’

‘yeah. they’ve been staying with me and my bro.’

‘so they already fought papyrus?’

Sans shifts his weight again, standing straighter than he was a moment before. ‘yeah. my brother really likes the kid.’

‘have they gone on a date with him yet?’

‘uh... yeah?’

‘good.’

There were soft shadows under his eye sockets. ‘why’s that good?’

‘it—’ Another barely visible shadow sat in the middle of his brow ridge. ‘—just is. its part of the game.’

‘okay.’

‘how about undyne, have they fought her?’

‘nah, i’d have heard about that.’

‘k. thats whats next. when they head to waterfall thats the story moving forward.’

‘great. thanks for the help, kid.’

You smashed enter and quickly typed, ‘wait, sans.’ His breathing stilled for the briefest of moments before he looked through the screen and towards you. ‘dont go yet.’

His hands were deep in his pockets, the folds in his coat more prominent than usual. ‘got something else to tell me?’

You couldn’t tell him how badly you missed having him around. You never knew him to begin with. You only knew a fake. You knew a caricature. ‘knock knock.’

‘who’s there?’

‘ketchup.’

The joke wasn’t even finished and you could already see the change in his eye sockets, a slight squint that made his grin feel real. ‘ketchup who?’

‘ketchup with me later and ill tell you a better joke.’

‘heheh, that’s pretty good. i might take you up on that.’

 

‘a little early to be on the computer, isn’t it?’

You looked away from your emails and slowly set down your drink. You honestly hadn’t expected the skeleton to come back the very next day. You opened your notepad. ‘morning sans. did something happen?’

‘nope. i saw this shortcut open on the way to my sentry station.’

‘i figured you could get here whenever you wanted.’

‘nah. seems pretty random to me. it’ll stay open a while, then it’ll be gone.’

You hummed to yourself as you took a sip of your drink. Sans didn’t look like he was in any rush to get to the point. ‘hey,’ you set your cup down and put both hands on the keyboard, ‘how about after you leave, does it hang around or go away?’

‘what are you thinking?’

‘maybe my comp has to be on? or maybe i need your program running? ive been turning everything off after we talk.’

‘makes sense.’

‘really?’

‘well.’ He shrugged. ‘it makes as much sense as getting stuck in a computer.’

That was true. This whole mess probably wasn’t  _ quite _ so weird to a magical skeleton monster as it was to you. ‘you know im human right?’

‘i figured as much, yeah.’

‘then...’ You looked at his face; Sans was watching your cursor blink with his usual bland expression. ‘does this mean you crossed the barrier?’

He shot an odd look your way, and it took a moment for you to realize that he really wasn’t looking at  _ you _ . He was looking at your screen, his eyes following along the edges. ‘i don’t think so, bud.’

‘my monitors part of it?’

‘looks like it from here.’

‘so you cant see me?’

‘nope.’

‘or hear me?’

‘depends. did you actually say something just now?’

You laughed and nodded. “Good point. I guess talking would help.” ‘now i did.’

‘nope, not a word.’

‘oh. okay.’ That was… sort of a relief. At least you wouldn’t have to watch what you said in your own room. After a long moment of watching the barrier — and definitely not you — Sans moved away from his corner and stepped to the middle of your screen. His eyes flickered here and there, watching something that you couldn’t see. When he took a hand out of his coat pocket and reached out, you leaned forward, resting your arms on your desk.

Just before his arm could extend fully, the skeleton’s fingers bumped against an invisible wall. He slid his fingertips across the surface. You couldn’t see any difference in your monitor, or with his image. Whatever he was touching, it wasn’t affecting anything as far as you could tell. He shifted his feet and you quickly typed, ‘careful,’ making him pause to look back at your text.

‘don’t worry about me, kid,’ Sans replied, looking towards you, or the barrier, or… whatever it was he could see. ‘i’m pretty good at this magic stuff.’ He winked, and you let out a huff of a laugh. He glanced down at his feet and shifted again, like he was nearing the edge of a cliff. For all you knew, that’s what your taskbar was to him. He pressed his palm flat against the barrier and  _ pushed _ .

Nothing happened.

He used both hands, but still nothing happened. Not on your end, and apparently not on his, either. ‘so,’ you typed when he was tired of trying, which really didn’t take all that long. ‘whats the verdict?’

‘no luck,’ he said, sticking his hands back into his pockets. ‘the magic feels as strong as the rest of the barrier.’

‘its probably a good thing you cant get through right now. youre super itty bitty. youd come out like 5 inches tall.’

‘heh, that right?’

‘itty bitty baby bones sans.’

He tucked his hands deeper into his pockets, glancing away from your text. ‘uhh…’

‘that would be super cute actually.’

‘what are you talking about, kid?’

‘itty bitty cutiepie baby bones sans. little bitty baby lazybones.’

Sans ducked his head and rubbed the back of his skull with one hand, his arm blocking your view of his face. ‘jeeze, you really know how to rattle a guy’s bones, don’t you?’

‘come on, its not my fault that anything that small is automatically adorable.’

‘yeah, uh, that might just be a human thing, y’know?’

‘do you really think so?’

You watched as Sans dropped his hand and stared up at your words for longer than it took to read them, then glanced your way. ‘maybe not  _ just _ humans.’

‘wait,’ you wrote, a small frown touching your lips. ‘do you know how you look right now?’ The look he sent you, the shadow along his brow and the slight narrowing of one of his eye sockets as if he was raising an eyebrow at you, told you no. ‘youre like a drawing, except alive and moving around and stuff.’

‘heheh, sounds sketchy to me.’

‘ha ha.’

‘c’mon, that was a good one.’ You had to agree, especially with the slight squint of the skeleton’s eye sockets softening his expression in a way that made him look so pleased with himself.

‘hey, do you think a ss would work?’

‘a what?’

‘screenshot.’

‘good question. why not try it?’

_ Why not. _ You pressed the button on your keyboard, then went to your desktop and opened up your art program. It took a moment to load, during which you watched Sans watch the program. Once it was loaded, you pasted the image and set the zoom to 100%, keeping the familiar sight of Sans in the frame.

The static Sans was stuck gazing ahead, thoughtful after posing his question. The real one had his back turned to you, the slope of his shoulders relaxed under his hood. ‘it's not very accurate.’

You pulled up your notepad and moved it out of the way. ‘whats different?’

‘last time i checked, i wasn’t a cartoon. good drawing though.’

‘ok but besides that?’ Sans shrugged, making you roll your eyes and lean back in your chair. ‘you are a skeleton though, right? not a dog monster or something?’

‘yeah.’

‘then it cant be that inaccurate. objectively.’

‘i guess you have a point there.’

‘so…’ Your fingers hovered just above the enter button, both yours and Sans’ eyes fixed on the cursor as it blinked. You pressed the button again, then began to type. ‘whats it like? being inside a computer?’

‘... weird enough that i don’t have any jokes ready.’

‘im sure youll think of some.’

It was clear Sans wasn’t going to argue with that when he shifted his weight, his attention nowhere near your notepad. You watched as his focus drifted across your desktop, over your icons, and up at his own dialogue box. He turned towards you. The focus in the lights of his eyes, the shadows beneath his eye sockets and along his brows, made a shiver slide down between your shoulder blades.

You were glad when that gaze turned back to your notepad. ‘you ever have one of those pop-up books?’ Sans asked.

‘yeah?’

‘it’s sort of like that,’ he said with a shrug. ‘everything is flat and spaced out. whenever you click on something, it comes up where i am. the rest, your desktop and things?’ He glanced towards your screen as he waved a hand towards some icons that weren’t hidden by your art program. ‘way back there.’

‘oh.’ It was easy to picture when he put it like that, but you were pretty sure that computers didn’t  _ actually _ work that way. At all. Actually, it didn’t make sense in the least... but neither did a character coming to life.

The sound of his dialogue made you look up from your keyboard. Sans was standing behind your notepad, tapping his foot against the taskbar, right over the program name. Each time his slipper hit it, the window would minimize, then restore itself. Minimize. Restore. ‘seems i can do more than wiggle your text around, too.’ His eyes followed the window, which covered everything from his chest to his skull when it was opened.

Minimize.

Restore.

Minimize…

‘would you stop???’

Sans paused, his toes poised right above the button, and leaned around the window to look towards you. ‘heh. sorry.’

You just sighed.

 

Sans didn’t stay for long.

You couldn’t very well ask him to, either. No matter how you missed having your friend around, that friend wasn’t Sans. That friend wasn’t  _ real _ . And Sans… Sans was a stranger. An acquaintance, if you wanted to be generous about it. This situation between the two of you was odd, but that feeling would pass. It would become normal. Boring.

You hoped it wouldn’t pass too quickly.

 

For an hour or so each day, Sans would come by for a visit. And, for an hour or so, the two of you would test what exactly he could do from inside of your computer. As it turned out, he could access all of the programs and files that you could. Pretty easily at that. What he couldn’t reach himself, he used your cursor to get to. As long as you didn’t touch your mouse, he had no trouble at all.

You didn’t talk much about the game, or what was going on in the Underground at all. It was a topic you were more than happy to avoid. As long as Sans was still showing up, nothing too terrible could be happening to everyone. You might not know the real Sans, but that was something you were certain of.

 

Mostly certain.

 

You tried not to worry too much.

 

It was typical to call and chat with one or more of your friends throughout the week. You had just finished one of these calls and put on some music when Sans showed up again. When you looked up from your phone, two minutes deep into one of your favorite songs to sing, the sight of him had you nearly falling out of your chair. “Holy  _ crap _ !”

There was a strange look on his face, his eye sockets narrowed and focused on some part of your monitor, off to your left. You pulled up your notepad, but it wasn’t until after his expression returned to its usual blandness that he bothered to look at what you’d typed. ‘you scared the crap out of me!’

‘yeah. i, uh…’ Your brows knit as he shifted his weight to one foot. ‘i heard.’

‘??’

‘... you. i heard you.’

“What…” ‘what??’

‘just now?’

‘i didnt touch anything??’

‘you were singing.’

Your microphone. “Oh my  _ god _ —” You yanked your headset off and all but threw it onto your desk, then shoved it even farther away. You, perhaps, should have been a tad gentler with your electronics.

Music continued to play, muffled now that it wasn’t against your ears.

The stiff wire holding your mic up started to droop, but you, hands braced on the edge of your desk, paid it no mind. No, you squeezed your eyes shut, took a deep breath, and tried  _ not _ to freak out.

Even Sans’ all too familiar dialogue sound, audible under your abandoned music, didn't make you look up. You scrubbed your hands over your face, then ran them through your hair.

Hands clasped at the back of your neck.

Inhale…

Exhale…

When you opened your eyes, Sans’ face was carefully blank, save for the faint lines around his eyes. You wondered, as you reached for your headset, if his expressions would be harder to read in person.

‘you alright?’ he asked.

You licked your lips, getting your headset settled just as you liked. “Y-yeah- Yes. You can hear me?”

‘yup.’

“Okay.”

‘... okay?’

“Yeah. Good—” Reaching up, you pressed your thumb to the outside corner of your eye and rubbed a small circle into your skin. “—Great. How are you?”

‘i’m alright,’ Sans replied with a shrug, and as he shrugged, the slight narrow of his eye sockets relaxed. ‘you sure didn’t sound too  _ jazzed _ to see me.’

You blinked at the stark letters in his dialogue box, then, with a huff, looked down at him. “That might work better if I  _ was _ listening to jazz.”

‘heh.’

“So…” Absently, you adjusted your microphone so it wasn’t quite so far from your mouth. “I… guess… this is a thing now.”

‘looks like it.’

“You, uh… you have much human music to listen to in the Underground?”

The ridges of his brow rose in surprise. Then, he laughed.

 

‘is that really what humans think i look like?’

It was hard not to notice when Sans popped up on your screen, even when you weren’t looking at it. None of your other alerts sounded anything like his voice… or, how his voice sounded to you. You smiled to yourself as you grabbed your headset, pulled it on, and made sure everything was plugged in. He winced as your microphone connected. Apparently it made an awful noise, but only for a moment. Your friends had had similar complaints when you answered calls before you were ready.

“Hey, Sans.” One of your friends had sent you a work-in-progress of a bit of fanart they’d spent the last half hour on. Sans, styled differently from the one you had gotten used to seeing, was the centerpiece of the image. The lines were still rough and sketchy with only indications of colors slapped on at the last second. “My bestie decided to draw you for a warm-up.”

Hands shoved in his pockets, Sans walked in front of your browser, blocking part of the image from your view as he examined it. ‘they’re pretty good,’ he said after a moment of staring. ‘but i gotta draw the line, getting my portrait done for me seems awfully sketchy.’

He peered back over his shoulder towards you when you laughed, pleased little creases appearing under the eye socket you could see. “Sorry, Sans, but she needs the Monet.” You couldn’t help your little giggle at your own joke, but after a beat, you realized that Sans looked a bit confused. “Oh… uhm…” Opening up a new tab in your browser, you started a search for the artist in question. “He was a painter,” you explained, pulling up a page for Sans to read. “He painted the same places over and over, capturing them at different times with different lighting and colors…” There. A collection of his works, laid out to cover the page completely, save for small captions beneath them.

You watched as Sans suddenly went still, his neck craned in what must have been an uncomfortable way as he looked up at the images. Then all at once, the stiff line of his shoulders relaxed.

Had he been… holding his breath?

‘... wow.’

You didn’t argue when he started to scroll through the paintings for himself.

For just a moment — just a second, really — you wondered what you would have seen in his face if he’d really been there with you.

“Do you get any, uh, art books and things falling into the Underground?”

Sans turned to look towards you, reaching up to scratch his jaw. ‘as much as we get any other books. they usually end up waterlogged. sometimes we get textbooks or magazines that make the trip in one piece.’

“What? Is that all?”

‘heh. dunno, i’m drawing a blank here.’

“... Wait,” you said slowly, re-reading his words before they disappeared. “Is that because art, or because books?”

‘c’mon, jokes are tearable if you’ve gotta explain them.’

“I hope you’re pleased with yourself.”

‘yup. so anyway, i could probably dig up some books if i tried. it’s not the kind i usually look for.’

“Let me guess,” you replied as you leaned back in your chair. “Science and joke books?”

Sans nodded. ‘cookbooks, too. my brother gets a kick out of ‘em. ‘course, there’s not always mushroom for substitutions in the recipes we find.’

You laughed and nodded, knowing full well that Sans couldn’t see you.

Actually… that gave you an idea.

“Hold on a second,” you told him as you pushed your chair away from your desk and ducked down to reach the shelves beneath it. Paying no mind to the sound of his text in your ear, you dug out a small box from underneath some construction paper. Your webcam wasn’t the best, but it worked well enough, when you did have a reason to plug it in. The box was abandoned on the floor as you stood up and mounted the camera to the top of your monitor. Then, leaning precariously over your desk, you reached around to the back of your computer to plug it in.

As you settled back down in your chair, Sans glanced over at the popup in the corner of your screen, letting you know that it had noticed the new device. Then, he looked towards you.

He looked  _ at _ you.

It wasn’t perfect, not by any means. He was looking just a little too high, and you, you preferred to look at him than at the camera.

Still, there was a focus in the lights of his eyes that hadn’t been there before. It wasn’t perfect... but Sans could see  _ you _ .

You grinned. “Hey.”

‘heya.’

“Want the grand tour?”

His eye sockets widened ever so slightly as the ridges of his brow rose. ‘yeah, that’d be great, bud.’

“Cool! Alright, so—” You leaned to your right, twisting to sweep an arm off towards one half of your room. “—there’s my bed. Good for sleeping, throwing stuff, and reading.”

‘not  _ bed _ . you make it yourself?’

You nodded seriously. Your bed wasn’t really made at all. The most you’d done was toss your blanket over the sheets. You hadn’t even moved your pillow out of the way first. “I did. Isn’t it beautiful?”

‘breathtaking.’

“I know. And here—” You leaned in the other direction this time, gesturing equally dramatically to the other side of your room. “—is the wall.”

‘wow.’

“I know.”

‘stunning.’

“Isn’t it, though?”

You were only a little disappointed that you couldn’t hear his laugh.

It still made you smile.

 

Sans looked tired.

Granted, it was a little hard to tell when he was a simplified image on a computer screen. Still. There was a darkness just under his eyes that you hadn’t seen in some time.

“Did something happen?”

‘heh. no “hello”?’

“Of course not,” you answered as you picked up your drink. “I’m a  _ very _ busy human.”

‘you look it.’

Your pajamas, you had to admit, might not have been all too convincing.

“Thanks. So, what’s going on?”

‘nothin’.’

Setting your drink back down, you glanced up at the camera, then back down at him. “Nothing? Then why do you look like you haven’t sle—”

‘ _ nothing _ has happened,’ Sans interrupted, casting a pointed glance behind him, towards the  _ Undertale _ icon on your desktop. ‘you said frisk would go to waterfall, right?’

“I… yeah. Yes.”

‘they haven’t.’

That didn’t make sense, and you were sure he could see your confusion when your brow furrowed. “Then… what  _ have _ they been doing?”

He shrugged. ‘hanging out? wandering around snowdin? they started going out to help papyrus with his puzzles. that’s a thing now.’

“Oh… but then, where’s Undyne? Shouldn’t she have heard about a human walking around by now?”

If you’d been seeing him in person, you doubt you would have noticed the bead of sweat that appeared on Sans’ skull. ‘about that… she hasn’t come by the house once since frisk decided to stay with us.’

“What?”

‘yup. it gets weirder. papyrus has been talking to her like he usually does, right? he’s always excited to show off his new friend… but whenever he gets home, he says he forgot to mention it.’ He was looking more uncomfortable the more he spoke. You couldn’t even see his breathing anymore. ‘i, uh, listened in one time that he’d called her.’ He took a hand from his pocket and waved it vaguely. ‘he’d  _ just _ been saying he was gonna invite her over to meet the human… as soon as she picked up, it was like frisk didn’t even exist. they talked about training and sentry duty and human hunting, but not frisk. that’s… not like my brother at all.’

No, it wasn’t. “What the hell…?”

‘i figured i might as well see if it was only my brother.’

You nodded. “Was it?”

‘no. i talked to alphys about it, since she has those—’

“Cameras, yeah.”

‘yeah. asked her to tell undyne that we needed to talk to her about a human thing.’

“Did she?”

‘so, she spent an hour dancing around calling.’ You almost smiled at that. It was easy to imagine her anxious posts as she worked herself up to it. ‘she calls me back, and i ask her about it. she says she  _ forgot _ .’

“How…” A headache was quickly pushing at the back of your head. “How does that make any sense…?”

‘it doesn’t.’

“Did you try calling Undyne?”

‘yup.’

“And you…”

‘yeah.’

_ How? _ Undyne  _ had _ to be the way to get the story going, so why couldn’t  _ any _ of them—

You remembered then where your own save had left off.

“You said they already fought Papyrus?” you asked, and Sans nodded. “ _ And _ went on a date with him?”

‘what’re you thinking, kid?’

“I…” Your hands were shaking when you looked at them. “I don’t know… but I think you need to leave.”

‘what’s happening?’

“I want to try something.”

‘what kind of  _ something _ are we talkin’ about?’

“It’s nothing bad, Sans. I swear, it isn’t. It might not even do anything at all.”

But, if it did…

You felt as tired as Sans looked.

He watched you for a long moment, his silence not quite as silent as it was meant to be as an ellipsis triggered his dialogue sound. Then, he nodded.

And was gone.

 

Your game left off where you remembered it had been. The savepoint in Snowdin.

It felt like you’d never played before. You might as well hadn’t with how long it had been, and how little you’d gotten done. It took a while for you to get back into it. Even then, it felt stranger than ever.

You went through Waterfall. Through Undyne’s battle. You nearly left it off there, but… if this  _ was _ real, you couldn’t leave her doing… whatever she did between Hotland and her friendship date with Frisk. Not if it meant she would stay stuck in place until things moved forward.

No matter how hard you tried, you couldn’t keep Frisk from a few deaths. Or yourself from wondering how that must have felt.

Just until Undyne. Then, you would see if… if  _ your _ game was...

 

Sans didn’t show up again for two days.

 

‘what did you do?’

It wasn’t his ‘voice’ that caught your attention. It was the dark dialogue box that popped up on your screen. You looked towards your desk, first at your camera, then at Sans himself as you finished pulling a shirt on over your bare torso. He didn’t look away then, and he didn’t look away as you went over to your chair, pulled your headset on, and got yourself settled. “Did it work?”

‘i’d say so, whatever it was.’

“They went through Waterfall?”

‘yup.’

“Why’d it take you so long to come back?”

‘uh… not sure what you mean, bud.’

“I mean, it’s been—”

‘hey,’ he cut you off, and made you realize you were leaning a bit too far forward in your chair. You frowned and sat back. ‘easy there. now, what did you  _ do _ ?’

“I… played the game?” Sans didn’t say anything to that, so you went on, “Only through Undyne’s story, because I wasn’t sure if anything would happen, but still. You said it did, right?”

‘yeah. guess it did.’

“So, this is great! Is Frisk back at your house? They did have their date with Undyne, right? Or did they not get to it yet?” Again, Sans seemed hesitant to say anything, and now you noticed tense lines at the edges of his grin. You rubbed a hand over your eye. “Sorry.”

It was hard to imagine how the whole thing made  _ him _ feel. All of your excitement seemed to make him uncomfortable.

Still, he offered a slight nod in your direction. ‘yeah, they’re back to crashing with us. undyne’s got the couch, so frisk and papyrus are sharing. what’d you mean, it took so long? they got back last night.’

“Oh.” That was certainly longer than it took you to go through the area. “It only took me a couple of hours. I thought...”

‘i’m guessing the underground in your… game is smaller than the real thing.’

Which made perfect sense. You felt more than a bit silly in retrospect. “Yeah, guess so…”

The two of you were silent for a long moment; you fighting off your embarrassment, and Sans deep in thought. He wasn’t even looking at you anymore, his gaze fixed off at one edge of your screen.

“I’ll help Frisk free everyone,” you told him, your voice quieter than you’d meant it. The way the lights of his eyes slid towards you, you knew he heard perfectly well. “I- I’ll make sure they get through it. Then you and Papyrus and everyone else…”

Sans stared.

“I will. I have to. I don’t know why- why  _ my _ game of all things—” You swallowed. Thinking about it now made your head spin, so you didn’t. Those questions, the ones you knew Sans had as well, were shoved aside. “As long as you all can be free, it doesn’t matter!”

‘buddy.’

It was like a dream.

‘i gotta tell ya…’

Like every fantasy you’d ever had, back when Sans was nothing more than a program.

‘... heh… you’re really somethin’ special.’

The look in his eyes, his easy grin, even the laugh you couldn’t hear.

It meant  _ everything _ .

 

You sent Sans off, warning him not to come back until everything was finished.

_ If _ he could come back.

 

It was weeks later that it showed up on the news. Monsters had emerged from beneath the earth, bringing with them incredible magic, and a single human child.

 

You were scrolling through some of your usual forums when the dogs started barking like mad. A glance at the clock told you it was probably the neighbors; they always went to work at different hours throughout the week.

Then, there were raised voices. Your grandmother sounded confused and somewhat distressed, and your step-dad moved from one room to the other to see what had startled her. You were quick to do the same and climbed out of your chair to head out to the front room.

Halfway down the hall, you could understand what they were saying.

There were monsters at the door.

Your heart leapt into your throat and you hurried to the door, calling to your family as you passed, “I’ll get it!”

They didn’t seem too comfortable at the idea, but it was too late. You swung open the front door.

“OH! HELLO, HUMAN!” Papyrus said from the other side of the glass storm door, his voice every bit as loud as you’d imagined it would be. He was tall — easily a foot taller than you, though you suspected it might be even more than that, if he wasn’t bent to peer inside at you. He held a folded piece of paper in one gloved hand. “I, THE GREAT PAPYRUS, AM HELPING MY BROTHER, SANS, FIND A FRIEND OF HIS! YOU WOULDN’T HAPPEN TO KNOW HIM, WOULD YOU?”

“I- I would,” you answered and stepped forward, gesturing for the skeleton to move away from the door. He did and you stepped outside, no sooner closing it that you pressed your back against the glass. Two of your dogs were still barking, the sound simultaneously louder and muffled, now that they were right up against the door. “Don’t mind them, they just- they just haven’t… uhm…”

Papyrus  _ was _ taller when he stood up straight. He reminded you of a boy that had been in your highschool that was taller than the rest of the class. Unusual, but not what you would call  _ monstrously _ tall.

You smiled, and Papyrus absolutely beamed. “DO NOT WORRY! I’M USED TO DOGS BARKING AT THINGS FOR NO REASON!”

“Thanks,” you replied. “You said Sans was-?”

“YES, OF COURSE!” Papyrus clapped his hands and stepped to the side, turning to look back at the short path between the porch and the driveway.

Sans was there, half hidden behind the greenery of your overgrown garden.

He shuffled his feet, his grin as present as ever as he lifted a bony hand in a wave.

Sans was  _ there _ .

He had come to find  _ you _ .

You could hardly process the thought, the rush of emotions that swept through your heart, through your  _ soul _ . He wasn’t the same as the drawing; he was  _ real _ , he was living and breathing right in your yard of all places. You recognized the slight shadow forming between his brow ridges as a mix of confusion and concern. You couldn’t blame him. Your eyes were stinging, you hadn’t said anything, but you  _ knew _ that expression that you had never seen, you knew  _ him _ and he—

The next moment, your face was pressed against his shoulder. You hadn’t even realized you’d moved, let alone wrapped your arms tightly around him. He hesitated, you could feel it in the way his arms raised, then stopped, his bones shifting beneath his coat. Moisture soaked into the fabric. Then, he held you just as tightly, just as  _ fiercely _ , a deep laugh rumbling from his chest.

The sound was beautiful.

And you, you laughed, too.

His hand touched the side of your head, and as you lifted your face from his shoulder, it moved to your cheek, your jaw. His fingers were rough; your face was warm. He tilted your head up, just enough to make sure that he was looking into your eyes. His were so much brighter than you had imagined, the sockets so much deeper and darker.

Sans pressed his forehead to your own and wiped his thumb across your cheek.

“nice to finally meet you, kid.”


End file.
